Exiled former Higher Education Minister Jonathan Moyo says he was never close to Emmerson Mnangagwa and the claim that his was a myth which exposes the lack of fact-checking in the Zimbabwean media and scholarship. It’s simply not true.
He told Alex Magaisa: “My beef with Mnangagwa is rooted in his direct, instigatory and supervisory involvement in Gukurahundi atrocities; and his leading role in the enforcement of the Rhodesian State of Emergency from 1980 to 1990.:
Moyo said: “While the Fifth Brigade was specifically created for genocidal purposes against Zapu and Ndebele people; and while arguments have been made to distance Mnangagwa from the Fifth Brigade under claims that he was not in charge of the army; the fact is that atrocities in Matabeleland started well before the deployment of the Fifth Brigade with Mnangagwa’s Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO) as the frontline perpetrators of those atrocities.
“Under Mnangagwa the CIO was a killing machine, especially in Matabeleland where the cold-blooded killings followed gruesome torture. Even after the Fifth Brigade was deployed, it is Mnangagwa’s CIO that used to make indications of targets for the Fifth Brigade and CIO operatives used to participate in the torture and killings together with the Fifth Brigade. This is documented history.”
Moyo said Mnangagwa is not presidential material at all.
“He is a very cruel person and his threat to separate my neck from my shoulders in the politburo and his boast that they used to separate necks from shoulders of comrades in Maputo is an example of extreme cruelty and barbarism. While he is clearly streetwise, he’s not a statesman by any stretch of the imagination,” Moyo said.
Below is an excerpt from the interview:
BSR: Some people cannot understand how you fell out with Mnangagwa. They believe you were close to Mnangagwa in the period leading to the famous Tsholotsho Declaration which was supposed to push the agenda for Mnangagwa’s ascendancy to the ZANU-PF vice presidency following the death of Vice President Simon Muzenda. You have denied that you were central to that plot, but you were punished for it. Some people think you never forgave Mnangagwa for failing to defend you. Did you feel betrayed by Mnangagwa? Is there any truth to these claims? What is the actual source of the bad blood that manifested so openly after he became Vice President?
ANSWER: The claim that I was close to Mnangagwa in the period leading to the so-called Tsholotsho Declaration is a myth which exposes the lack of factchecking in the Zimbabwean media and scholarship. It’s simply not true. There’s no corroborating evidence to support that claim. Nobody can point to any gathering or meeting or activity that links me with or in which I participated with Mnangagwa prior to the prize giving event at Dinyane High School. A swallow does not make a summer.
It does not make sense for people to conclude that I was close to Mnangagwa on the strength of one event that I became associated with by virtue of coming from the district where the event was held. Prior to the Dinyane event, there was a similar speech and prize giving event at Ntalale High School in Matabeleland South which I did not know about until after the fact. There were other Mnangagwa events elsewhere around the country and I attended none of them. So how did I become close to him simply by attending the Tsholotsho event? Add to this the fact that I was not on the panel of speakers at the Tsholotsho event, whose leading lights were Patrick Chinamasa, Jacob Mudenda and Josiah Hungwe. Claims that I have ever been close to Mnangagwa are legion yet fanciful.
My beef with Mnangagwa is rooted in his direct, instigatory and supervisory involvement in Gukurahundi atrocities; and his leading role in the enforcement of the Rhodesian State of Emergency from 1980 to 1990. While the Fifth Brigade was specifically created for genocidal purposes against Zapu and Ndebele people; and while arguments have been made to distance Mnangagwa from the Fifth Brigade under claims that he was not in charge of the army; the fact is that atrocities in Matabeleland started well before the deployment of the Fifth Brigade with Mnangagwa’s Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO) as the frontline perpetrators of those atrocities. Under Mnangagwa the CIO was a killing machine, especially in Matabeleland where the cold-blooded killings followed gruesome torture.Even after the Fifth Brigade was deployed, it is Mnangagwa’s CIO that used to make indications of targets for the Fifth Brigade and CIO operatives used to participate in the torture and killings together with the Fifth Brigade. This is documented history.
The fact that Mnangagwa did not defend me when I was punished for attending and supporting his Dinyane High School event in Tsholotsho is not an issue to me.President Mugabe thought it was an issue on account of my anger when I narrated it to him and the politburo last year. Prior to that angry narration, Mnangagwa had openly threatened to kill me, after I presented a video on his and Chiwenga’s coup plot in the politburo in July 2017, by declaring to the politburo that the best way deal with people like me is to do what they used to do to “sellouts” in Maputo whose necks used to be separated from their shoulders. Mnangagwa’s threat to me was also a confirmation of his murderous deeds in Maputo. I sat in the politburo looking at him and thinking of what happened to my father and I got very angry, leading to my angry outburst which was referenced by President Mugabe.
All said, my considered judgment has always been that Mnangagwa is not presidential material. He is a very cruel person and his threat to separate my neck from my shoulders in the politburo and his boast that they used to separate necks from shoulders of comrades in Maputo is an example of extreme cruelty and barbarism. While he is clearly streetwise, he’s not a statesman by any stretch of the imagination.
National and world leaders are well read people of letters. President Mugabe was and still is a man of letters. He is a well-read gentleman. I have always wondered whether Mnangagwa has ever read any book besides school and college textbooks he had to read as a student. You can tell whether a person reads books by their speech.People who read books are great speakers and great thinkers.Mnangagwa is not in this category.
In any event, it cannot be right that a person who oversaw the CIO during the Gukurahundi days and the state of emergency when the CIO was a killing machine that used extreme torture methods can become a president of a constitutional democracy. It just cannot be. It is not surprising that it took a military coup for Mnangagwa to become president.He had no other path.It is also not a surprise that the same military stole the election for him. Again, he had no other path.
I should add here that between 2010 and 2014 I became very close to Chiwenga. Very close. We worked together between 2010 and 2012 to try and bring a Chinese company to mine gold in Tsholotsho with a condition that the company would build the Tsholotsho-Bulawayo road. The project almost succeeded. I was pained that it did not.
In 2013, I worked with Chiwenga to manage potential explosive political issues that arose after the Zanu-PF primary elections. It is Chiwenga who supported my work to put together the Zanu-PF campaign team for the 2013 elections and to resource the campaign team. I spent a lot of time on the national campaign working with Chiwenga in Harare and ended up going to campaign Tsholotsho North only 10 days before the election.
When I lost the election, and I told Chiwenga of the result, he advised me to forget about it and to return to Harare immediately where there was lots of work for me to do. When I was appointed to the cabinet in 2013 as one of the five members appointed from outside Parliament, I had no doubt that Chiwenga had put a pivotal recommendation based on the work I did in leading the 2013 Zanu-PF national campaign in Harare. President Mugabe said as much to me.I continued to work closely with Chiwenga from 2013 to December 2014.
Things dramatically changed after the December 2014 Zanu-PF Congress that elevated Mnangagwa to vice president. Thereafter, each time an issue came up about the party or government, Chiwenga would ask me if I had checked with “Shumba”. Suddenly, everything was Shumba this and Shumba that.
I was uncomfortable and unwilling to subject myself to the Shumba regime when my appointing authority was President Mugabe. I was also aware of the shenanigans that had taken place for Mnangagwa to become vice president ahead of Muchinguri. My unwillingness to subject myself to the Shumba regime is the reason there was a total and complete fallout between Chiwenga and me. He was outraged by my refusal and I was outraged by his insistence.This was very sad and tragic. The rest is history.
Source: Bulawayonews
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